The present invention relates in general to the telecommunication and postal industries, and in particular to a combination of telephone call cards, postcards, special events cards, coupons, gift certificates or aerograms, to provide prepaid and/or postpaid communication means.
Telecommunication, a form of audio message transfer, is by for the most popular form of communication because of its convenience and speed. A telephone call provides the benefit of speaking to each other for parties and persons who are geographically separated.
Postal communication, a form of visual message transfer, provides a means of communicating in writing between people and for exchanging written documents and materials. Telecommunication is replacing postal communications for providing the benefit of interactive conversation as well as making it possible for exchange of written information rapidly by fax. However, in many parts of the world, access to means of telecommunication is not easy, practical or affordable.
The prior art includes examples of items which combine a telephone calling card with a greeting card (U.S. Pat. No. 5,629,977, issued to Fonseca, F. on May 3, 1997) or a card including an electronic device containing a recorded message (U.S. Pat. No. 5,652,606, issued to Sasaki, N. et al. on Jul. 29, 1997). Fonseca discloses a method and assembly for allowing telephone calling credit to be provided in conjunction with a greeting card. The greeting card comprises a greeting card, an envelope having an inside pocket adapted to receive the greeting card and a calling card access identifier designating a account against which telephones can be charged. Thus, Fonseca discloses an invention which comprises several separate items and which is suitable for greeting cards (most probably for special occasions such as birthdays, anniversaries, or weddings) which must first be placed into the envelope. The envelope further needs to be sealed after adding the calling card and finally to be stamped. The main disadvantages of this assembly and method are: 1) the inconvenience of having to buy and/or deal with several items separately rather than have everything in a single unit, and 2) the cost of the individually purchased greeting card/calling card,envelope and stamp.
Sasaki et al. discloses a message card which includes a button type dry battery, a visual image display, a speaker, a control circuit for recording, storing and reproducing both of visual images and audio messages data, and a flexible circuit substrate for the control circuit. The electronic device used in this invention is complex, expensive, heavy and requires an outside energy source such as batteries to run it. Thus, the invention disclosed by Sasaki et al. is unsuitable for providing a convenient, easy and cheap system and method for combining the audio and visual message transfers in one unit. It is therefore important to provide a method and combination of a postal communication, providing postal communication and a telephone calling card, providing the benefits of telecommunication in a unique single card product.